Midweek Lent 1 – Pr. Anderson sermon
Psalm 51:4-5 “Recognizing against Whom We Sin”
March 12, 2025 | Christ Lutheran Church
In Nomine Iesu
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Heavenly Father, we come before you with sorrow of heart. Our transgressions against your holy Law bear down on us daily. While we can’t stand in your presence on our own two feet, we call on you dearest Father to have mercy on us for the sake of your Son, Jesus Christ. We acknowledge our faults. Faults we have had since the day of our conception. O Merciful God, bring us ever closer to you and your undeserved grace that comes to us through the cross of Christ. Forgive us our sins and bring us into everlasting life. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. (Rom. 1:7, etc.)
“You better say you’re sorry” are words no child wants to hear. Once those words were uttered, you knew deep down in your soul that you were in big trouble. You also knew that if you didn’t say sorry in that instance, there would have been more problems probably coming instantly afterwards. Before you say those words, for good measure you likely heard, “and you better mean it.” Telling someone you are sorry, even when you know that you did something wrong is still very hard to do. Why is that? It is hard because if we take Scripture to its truth, then it means we are by nature evil. Sometimes accidents happen, but I’m sure we can think of a time when we did mean for something we did or say to hurt. As much as the world tries, there is no escaping the evil that is in our hearts in this life. While our parents taught us how to recognize when we harmed someone, David teaches us that when we sin, there is someone else we need to recognize. Recognizing against whom we sin is part of the process of repentance and then receiving forgiveness.
The easy answer is to look at the immediate problem. When you think back to the parable that Nathan is telling David, he of course shows David all the parties involved. David’s heartstrings are pulled in the right direction as he sees that he did in fact sin against multiple people. He sinned against Bathsheba, he sinned against Uriah, he sinned against Joab, but there is one missing. The one who David is missing is the crucial step. It is crucial for him, and it is crucial for us to recognize it also. The answer comes out when Nathan said to David, “You are the man! Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, ‘I anointed you king over Israel, and I delivered you out of the hand of Saul’ (2 Samuel 12:7). This is the gut punch that is missed by many. It is easy to feel the punch in the words, “you better say you’re sorry,” because we see our sibling crying and we hear the anger in our mother’s voice. How about feeling these words from God Most High?
Now David isn’t justifying one over the other, which is a temptation many can be sucked into. In the verses we will soon hear, David does confess what he has done is evil. He committed adultery with Bathsheba. He had her husband Uriah killed, and he used his general to do it. It is easy for us to recognize sins that we commit against our neighbors because there will be a reaction. For David, this resulted in Bathsheba having a funeral for her husband, becoming the wife of David, and having a child. So, when we hear the two great commands, there are times we hear the second one of loving our neighbor and we forget it is tied directly to the first one of loving God. The temptation will most likely be, “Well God isn’t here, He’s invisible.” Scripture teaches just how wrong this thought is for anyone to have. St. Paul writes, Let God be true though every one were a liar, as it is written, “That you may be justified in your words, and prevail when you are judged” (Romans 3:4). Man will never succeed with his judgments of God.
Furthermore, in our text for today, David will go on to say even more about his and our sinful state. The statement he makes is very eye-opening when you realize how it ties to the sin he committed. David confesses that “in sin his mother conceived him.” He confesses this when he was born to two parents who were properly married. As his parents had him in the confines of marriage, David has a child through adultery. Yet David confesses that while he was in the womb, he was full of sin. Here is the picture of our sinful nature that has been passed down to us from our original parents, Adam and Eve. No matter how hard we try to cover up or make excuses, there is no escaping the truth of God’s Word and the truth that without God, we will always be evil. In this truth we can only recognize one thing. We can only recognize that the person we sin against every time is none other than the Lord God.
As David recognizes who he has sinned against, the hardest part is then confessing it. David does confess he sinned against the Lord, and he acknowledges that he must accept the consequences. The Holy Spirit has created that change of the heart. David is not the first one to have this happen. Many years later when three crosses stood above Golgotha, one thief said, “Do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we are receiving the due reward of our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong” (Luke 23:40-41). Like David and the thief on the cross, the one who has done nothing wrong and has no sin says, your sins are forgiven. The world does not deserve the One who has been sinned against, granting forgiveness. Yet, forgiveness comes from God Most High.
In true confession and repentance to God Most High you say, “Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.” Knowing this and confessing it every time you are in this building, you hear the words afterward like David and the thief, “I, by virtue of my office as a called and ordained servant of the Word, announce the grace of God to all of you, and in the stead and by the command of our Lord Jesus Christ I forgive you all your sins, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” While you recognize your sins go against God, you also recognize your forgiveness comes from the Son of God.
Recognizing Jesus as the Son of God continues to reveal the truth of the Gospel message. As certain as you are of witnessing God around us in the world you can be just as certain in His love to send His Son. A Son who puts on your flesh and blood and born without sin only to grow and put on every single one of yours. As Jesus carried all your sins, He never once went against His heavenly Father’s will. He knew no sin, yet God’s judgment fell on Him so hard that the Father couldn’t even look at His own Son. While you can only ask for repentance accept your consequences, Jesus accepted your judgment. The gavel was swung declaring Him guilty. Jesus reverses the damage created by original sin. He recognizes who the worlds sin was against, and eternal death is taken away by the One who dies on the cross for His ancestor David, for the thief by His side, and for you.
Out of all the things the world can do that is repetitive, repenting and receiving forgiveness from God can sometimes not one of them. The world would rather think that everyone is inherently good. Evil is far from the term they would use. You know the truth. The same truth David confesses, knowing he has sinned against God because that is all he can do. There has been no good in him, even since his conception. As David repeats this act in the Psalms, God continues to remind him, and He continues to remind you that behind repentance is forgiveness. This is why you are here, and you keep coming. This is the only place you will hear this message repeatedly. This is why during Lent; the church meets more. In repentance, you say and mean it when you say the word “sorry.” And God, who recognizes your sins, recognizes them no longer when you are washed in the blood and forgiven from Jesus’ death on the cross. Amen.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost; as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, forevermore. Amen.
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